NTA says NEET paper leak allegations are ‘completely baseless’

Allegations of question paper leak in the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (Undergraduate) or NEET-UG are “completely baseless” and “without any ground”, the National Testing Agency (NTA), which conducts the medical entrance examination, clarified on Monday.
NEET-UG was conducted across the country on Sunday with a total of 2.4 million students registering for it.
Stressing that every question paper has been “accounted for”, the NTA in a statement on Monday said that purported images of the question paper circulating on social media have no relation with the actual paper.
“It has been ascertained from NTA’s security protocols and Standard Operating Procedures that the social media posts pointing towards any paper leak are completely baseless and without any ground. To put rumours to rest, it is also stated that every single question paper has been accounted for,” Sadhana Parashar, senior director, NTA, said in the statement.
Parashar said that no external person or agency can access the centres once the examination starts. After the gates of the examination centres are closed, no one from outside is permitted access inside the halls, which are under CCTV surveillance, she added.
“All other photographs of question papers circulating in social media have no relation to the actual examination question paper which has been administered,” Parashar said.
Ever since the medical entrance exam was conducted on Sunday across 4,750 centres in 571 cities, social media was abuzz with rumours of paper leak.
Rejecting the rumours, the NTA on Sunday claimed that the distribution of wrong question papers at an exam centre in Rajasthan led to some candidates walking out with the papers. The agency had denied any leak of the question paper.
“The integrity of the examination process was not compromised. The exam was later reconducted for the 120 affected candidates at the centre,” Parashar said on Sunday.
The agency said the pictures of the question papers from the Rajasthan incident were being circulated in “mischievous and preposterous” attempt to claim paper leak.
The NTA, however, accepted there have been cases of malpractice or impersonation where strict action has been taken against the involved candidates.
“NTA also conducts post-exam data analysis to detect cases of Unfair Means (UFM), action on which is taken as per extant rules, which includes cancellation of candidature and debarment from future examinations,” the NTA said.
The matter took a political turn on Monday after Congress leader Rahul Gandhi in a social media post said the alleged paper leak was a “betrayal of the dreams” of over 2.3 million students and their families.
“…The youth and their families who have been paying the price of the BJP government’s inefficiency for the past 10 years by ruining their future have now understood that there is a difference between speaking and running a government,” he said in a post in Hindi on X, adding his party has “pledged to free the youth from paper leaks by making strict laws”.